Tagged: Birkmayer

On Tuesday 21st December, 1824, James Parkinson passed away in his home – two days after suffering a stroke.

It was the end of an amazing and extremely productive life.

In this post about James Parkinson – the final in the series of four observing the 200th anniversary of his first observation of Parkinson’s disease – we look at what happened following his death, and reflect on his overall legacy.

St Leonard’s church in Hoxton, London – James’ church

At the end of the third post on the life of James Parkinson (Click here to read that post), the Battle of Waterloo had just occurred and James was publishing the last of his writings.

One of the last major events in the life of James Parkinson occurred in 1823, when James was awarded the Royal College of Surgeons’ first Gold Medal.

Understand that this was a big deal.

The college had established the award way back in 1802 for “distinguished labours, researches and discoveries”. But it took them a full 21 years to find anyone that they thought worthy enough to be the first recipient.

And that first recipient: one James Parkinson

This event, however, represents very nicely how the legacy of James has changed over time. While the world currently associates James Parkinson with a neurological condition that he first described in 1817, the Royal College of Surgeons awarded him their first gold medal not for any of his medical publications, but rather for his “splendid Work on Organic Remains”.

As I have written before, James was a bit of a rockstar to the geological/palaeontology community. His writings on what he called his “favourite science”, had earned him an international reputation and one has to wonder how he would feel now if he knew that his reputation lies elsewhere.